Academic literature on the topic 'Nigeria. Public Complaints Commission'

Laden with corruption, fear, and lack of job security, politicization reigns supreme; one would expect nothing short of low or poor performance of the accountability institutions in Nigeria. There have been lots of scholarly works on accountability, accountability institutions, administration and performance of one accountability institution or the other. It was revealed that majority of the studies examined the activities or performance of these accountability institutions. Most of the scholars that wrote on accountability institutions in Nigeria picked one institution at a time and more often than not, limit their study to limitations, challenges and impediments of performance; and/or at best bring out impediments of delivery of service. Some of the foreign scholars’ writings and works conformed to the peculiarities of their environment which is different from what exists in Nigeria of today. What they wrote did not foresee the influence of politics on administration and did not put peculiarity of Nigeria into consideration. Issues like above the law syndrome, sacred cows, godfatherism, nepotism, favouritism, etc were not considered. This study in its peculiar form, afforded the staff of Public Complaints Commission and Code of Conduct Bureau the opportunity for self-assessment and self auditing; they were bulk of the respondents for both the questionnaire administration and interview. Accountability institutions in Nigeria have been alleged of not performing up to expectation or not performing at all by the public. It is against this background that this study seeks to assess the structure and modus operandi of the Code of Conduct Bureau and Public Complaints Commission in enthroning accountability in Governance. The study found out from the available information collected through the administration of questionnaire and conduct of in-depth interview that the awareness of Public Complaints Commission (PCC) and Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) is not in any way in-doubt amongst the elites in the country; the structure are perfect enough for the purpose for which it is set; there is cordial relationship between the superior and the subordinate; and there is room for free flow of information in the institutions.

After about 15 (fifteen) years of its formation, the Prosecutors Commission is deemed not optimal in its performance of duties, especially in dealing with public report or complaint, considering that the provisions of Article 4 item a and b Presidential Regulation on Prosecutors Commission that is the basis for the Prosecutors Commission to perform its duties as set forth in Article 3 Presidential Regulation concerning Prosecutors Commission causes multiple interpretations that, according to the provisions of Article 4 item a in performance of its duties of supervising, monitoring and assessing the performance and behaviors of prosecutors and/or employees of Prosecutor Office, the Prosecutors Commission has the authority to accept and follow up public reports or complaints, the extent of the Prosecutors Commissions authority to follow up public reports or complaints are not clearly regulated. However, according to the provisions of Article 4 item b, it is the Prosecutors Commissions authority to forward public reports or complaints to the Attorney General for follow-up. According to the provisions of Article 10 Presidential Regulation No. 18 of 2011 concerning Prosecutors Commission, the Prosecutors Commission has the right to participate in the hearing of a case which attracts public attention. Therefore, the Prosecutors Commission needs to make efforts to optimize its duties performance in dealing with public complaints, for example, by using the concept of the progressive law theory popularized by Satjipto Raharjo, that in progressive law application, law is not enforced according to the letter, but according to the very meaning of laws or regulations in a broad sense. Similarly, in performance of the Prosecutors Commissions authority in dealing with complaints, in which the authority is deemed to have weaknesses, the Prosecutors Commission cannot perform its functions optimally as an external supervisory agency. All this time, the Prosecutors Commission, in dealing with complaints, only focuses on reviewing the substance of complaint without performing functional supervisory activities such as monitoring, data collection, inspection and review. The reason is since the Prosecutors Commission has not applied the progressive law, while in dealing with public complaints related to cases which attract public attention, the Prosecutors Commission should have the psychology and morality to position itself as the avant-garde in dealing with cases which attract public attention, so as to give justice to the people in dealing with cases transparently and accountably. As a concrete measure of optimizing its duty performance, the Prosecutors Commission has internally amended the Prosecutors Commission regulations which are deemed not conforming to the progressive law, such as the amendment to the provisions of Article 1 point 14 of Prosecutors Commission Regulation number PER-05/KK/04/2012. In addition, the progressive law should be applied to Prosecutors Commissions preventive supervision by participating in the hearing of important cases dealt with by Prosecutors, either directly or by using technology, such as attending a hearing online, thus the presence of the Prosecutors Commission will be felt better, which means that the purpose of the Prosecutors Commission formation as an external supervisory agency for better transparency and accountability is achieved.

Public service broadcasting (PSB) has come under considerable pressure by the EU Commission. This is due to the fact that the Commission treats broadcasting as a service as any other and therefore applies the competition regulation of the EC Treaty to broadcasting stations, independent of their commercial interests or public service mission. Against this background, the financing of public broadcasting is regarded as being state aids that are only allowed under special circumstances. In recent years, several commercial broadcasters from different member states filed complaints and claimed distortion of competition through state aids for public service broadcasting. At first, the Commission remained reluctant but has meanwhile adopting an active role, finally pushing aside the member states although, according to the Amsterdam Protocol, they have the competence to define the remit of PSB and to decide about its funding. This battle is about to change the broadcasting systems of the European countries where PSB has been a defining feature for more than 50.

This journal discussing about the efforts of the Australian Human RightsCommission (AHRC) to reduce racial discrimination cases in Australia 2015-2018. The AHRC efforts was defined into five rules and procedures for resolving racial discrimination complaints. They are socialization or early warning, collecting complaints and investigation, fulfillment, continuation of legal actions, and public hearings. The Australia’s moment ratified the rules of the United Nations of Human Rights Commissioner (UNHRC), namely the CERD rules concerning the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination which sparked the 1975 Racial Discrimination Act could construct the formation of the AHRC in 1986. The principle of UNHRC is an organization known as regime which adopted in Australia in the form of AHRC. This journal aims to discuss, describe and find out the efforts of the Australian Human Rights Commission in reducing cases of racial discrimination in Australia 2015-2018. Explain the rules and procedures for resolving racial discrimination complaints received by the AHRC through five stages of resolution. Afterwards analyze whether the five rules and procedures implemented by the AHRC implemented optimally to reduce racial discrimination cases which happened in Australia in 2015-2018.

The Right to Information (RTI) Act, 2005, has ushered in a new era of transparent governance. It makes citizens more resourceful and powerful to expose to the public the maladministration in public authorities. But this task is challenging due to prevailing culture of secrecy and lackadaisical attitude of Central Public Information Officers/State Public Information Officers (CPIOs/SPIOs), who act as hubs to implement information regime. To regulate their duties, arrangement has been made to constitute Central Information Commission (CIC) and State Information Commissions (SICs). Their vigilant observation and fair outlook play a vital role in establishing corruption-free governance. This article examines the adjudicatory role of Haryana State Information Commission by selecting the data from 2005 to 2018 with regard to disposal of enquiries, complaints and appeals. After presenting the powers and functions of the State Commission, year-wise data are presented in tabular form to have a look at the performance of the commission in dealing with the RTI applications. Besides, a brief summary is also given presenting the number of delinquent SPIOs, who have not deposited the penalties imposed by the commission. It is a serious challenge before the commission. On this critical aspect, facts and arguments are discussed to assess the role of the full commission and individual commissioners in disposal of RTI matters. Due to lacklustre performance of the commission to ensure voluntary disclosure compliance and speedy disposals, the author feels concerned and opines that if these disquieting trends are not nipped in bud, then the commission may come to be perceived as a mere scarecrow.

<p>The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) ACT of 2005 provided the legal framework for the adoption of PPP for infrastructure development in Nigeria. This paper therefore examined the implications of the adoption of PPP for infrastructure development in Nigeria with a view to enhancing infrastructure projects delivery. The paper acknowledged the timeliness of the initiative in Nigeria owing to the wide infrastructure gap and progressive severe cut back in budgetary allocation and implementation. The paper recommended that political will, good governance and human capacity building will be required to maximise the benefits from the initiative by all stakeholders.</p>

Twenty years after Ireland adopted an external supervisory board model to promote public confidence in the handling of complaints against the police (the Garda Síochána), it had to replace it with a cross between the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland and the Independent Police Complaints Commission in England and Wales. This paper examines the nature and scale of the board's failure and offers a critique of the internal and external factors responsible. It focuses, in particular, on how the police and the government, acting separately and in combination, managed to smother the potential of the supervisory board model. It also offers insights into how the board contributed to its own failure. The paper concludes by drawing attention to the fact that several of these negative forces can also be active in the new complaints procedure that commenced operations in 2007.

Abstract On July 13, 2013, the Commission for Public Complaints released the Report Following a Public Interest Investigation into the Conduct of RCMP Members in Nova Scotia in Respect to Matters Involving Nicole (Ryan) Doucet. After interviewing all parties involved and reviewing 25 incidences involving Ms. Doucet and Mr. Ryan, the Acting Commissioner, Ian McPhail, concluded the RCMP’s policy regarding violence in relationships “was followed at all times.” According to The Report, the RCMP did not fail to protect Ms. Doucet. These conclusions, however, seem to be at odds with the evidence presented in The Report. After discussing coercive control and reviewing R. v. Ryan, the paper analyses the Commission’s findings to argue that the evidence presented to the Commission clearly illustrates that police ignored Ms. Doucet’s repeated pleas for help. The Commissioner missed a real opportunity to review current RCMP policies on domestic violence to bring them in line with current and on-going research on coercive control.

Touts can be defined as free-lance workers at railway stations, airports, ferry points, and especially motor-parks, who undertake the self-imposed responsibility of recruiting and organising passengers who wish to travel by road, and for this work they receive a fee, or more appropriately, a ‘commission’, that is generally paid by the drivers of the vehicles just before their departure. All the owners are private entrepreneurs, who both compete and collaborate with one another to provide road transport for the public.

The reform measures recommended by the Commission of Inquiry into Possible Illegal Activities and Associated Police Misconduct (referred to as the "Fitzgerald Inquiry") radically transformed the face of policing in Queensland. The most significant of these recommendations was the establishment of an external oversight body, the Criminal Justice Commission (CJC), which has independence from executive government and holds the power to investigate not only police but any public servant or politician. Other recommendations included "Whistleblower" legislation, increasing sanctions for serious misconduct, lateral recruitment and promotion by merit rather than seniority. The first main research question tested in this thesis is whether these reform measures have produced improvements in the following areas: the efficiency and effectiveness of the processes for dealing with complaints against police; public confidence in those processes and the public standing of the Queensland Police Service (QPS) generally; standards of police behaviour; the incidence of corrupt conduct; and police attitudes towards reporting misconduct by their fellow officers. These Fitzgerald Inquiry reforms were strategies primarily derived from two schools of thought describing the nature and cause of police corruption: deterrence based theory (including "individual" or "rotten apple" theory) and cultural (also labeled "cultural" or "socialisation") based theory. To date most strategies used to combat police corruption have been underpinned by these theories. A third theory - situational based theory (sometimes titled "environmental" or "opportunity" theory) - which has had success in crime prevention, has been scarcely used in the area of police corruption. However, an extensive body of research has affirmed the effects of situational factors on police behaviour, suggesting the potential for the application of situational crime prevention initiatives in combatting police corruption. The second research question proposed in this thesis is whether situational based theory could also be beneficial in the prevention of police corruption. Data drawn upon to test the first research question were interviews and surveys with police officers, public attitude surveys and statistics from the processing of complaints against police. Although each source has limitations, collectively the data are sufficiently comprehensive - and robust - to defend conclusions about the general direction of the changes which have occurred. These data indicate that the Fitzgerald Inquiry reforms have, at least to some degree, had their intended impact on the QPS. These reforms have contributed to an apparent improvement in public confidence in the complaints system and the QPS generally. Moreover, the available evidence suggests that the Fitzgerald Inquiry reforms have resulted in a weakening of the police code of silence. As far as the specific issue of corruption in the QPS is concerned, it is difficult to draw firm conclusions from existing data sources. However, the weight of the available evidence is that such conduct is less pervasive and occurs at lower levels than was the case in the pre-Fitzgerald Inquiry QPS. It is very difficult to ascertain which reform components were the most effective and which were not helpful at all, as these reform measures were initiated simultaneously. For example, the negative elements of the police culture may have been eliminated or reduced but whether it was the cultural strategies or one of the deterrence based strategies influencing officer behaviour remains unknown. The second main research question the thesis poses is that the use of situational crime prevention techniques has potential for contributing to the prevention of police corruption. A situational analysis of complaints against police data, including the development of a typology for classifying types of police corruption and misconduct, was used as an example of how this may be accomplished in Queensland. The study provides some, albeit limited, support for the hypothesis that situational crime prevention methods are applicable to police corruption. Based upon three years of complaints data, enough homogenous cases were gathered to enable the analysis of four categories of police corruption - Opportunistic Thefts, Driving under the Influence, Assault (while off-duty), and Theft from Employer. Given that this study only used three years of complaints data held by the CJC and more than nine years of data exist, productive situational analyses of many other categories of corruption is probable. This study also illustrated that complaints against police data are being under utilised by the QPS and the CJC. For future research in the situational analysis of complaints data, I recommend improving the gathering of data from complaints files for storage in electronic form to enable situational prevention analysis to be conducted more readily. A geographical example was used to illustrate further how complaints against police data could be more extensively utilised as a prevention tool. This analysis was conducted at an organisation unit level determined primarily by geographical factors. The complaint patterns of units of similar "task environments", as measured by unit size and type of duties performed, were compared in an attempt to identify those units experiencing the presence or absence of "bad apples" or a "negative culture". This study led to the conclusion that a divisional analysis of complaints data can provide information valuable in combatting police corruption. When task environment was held constant, it was possible to identify units experiencing the effects of possible "bad apples" and/or "negative cultures". Once these particular units were identified, intervention strategies to address the units' particular problem could be constructed. Future research in this area would involve ongoing divisional data analysis followed-up by individual assessment of officers identified as "bad apples", or a "compare-and-contrast" procedure to distinguish features requiring correction in units identified as having a "negative culture". The research findings presented in this thesis are that progress has occurred in a number of areas in addressing the problems identified by the Fitzgerald Inquiry, but that there is undoubtedly scope for more to be achieved. Despite the very significant increase in the resources and powers available to investigators post-Fitzgerald, it is still difficult to prove that a police officer engaged in misconduct, or that other officers were aware of this fact and had failed to take action, because of the constraints imposed by evidentiary and legal requirements. Thus, while it is vital to maintain an effective and credible independent complaints investigation system and ensure that there is a proper internal discipline process in place, the scope for increasing the "deterrent power" of the present system is limited. Putting more resources into complaints investigations might make a difference at the margins, but is unlikely to lead to a significant increase in the probability of a complaint being substantiated and a sanction imposed. Investing more resources in investigations has an additional cost in that such resources are then lost to other efforts to combat corruption that may provide more fruitful results in the long term. The value of an occasional substantiation is placed above the ability to engage in a large amount of prevention work. Inevitably then, three clear messages are apparent. First, continued effort must be made to modify the organisational climate of the QPS in terms of commitment to integrity. Recommended strategies to accomplish this end are to continue the recruitment of more educated, female and older officers to reduce police-citizen conflict and the negative elements of the police culture, and also to develop a comprehensive, integrated approach to ethics education for QPS officers at all ranks and positions. Second, other forms of deterrence against misconduct are needed such as the use of covert strategies like integrity testing which could be conducted in conjunction with the CJC. Third, a greater emphasis needs to be placed on developing and implementing preventive strategies. This thesis has shown that valuable prevention strategies can be gained from situational and divisional analysis of complaints data, and a range of proactive management options based upon situational crime prevention theory are recommended. These strategies have application in any police service.

The incessant complaints by civil society organizations and the general public in Nigeria against exploitative charges by tour operators and travel agencies on hapless Hajj and Umrah pilgrims call for careful examination. Previously, some of these unscrupulous tour operators have hidden under the excuse of the high cost of visas to charge exorbitant fees. However, with the recent clarification from the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Nigeria that both Hajj and Umrah visas are free, it is clear that some travel agencies have been exploiting Nigerian pilgrims. This chapter is conducted in order to address this issue. Consequently, the chapter attempts to provide relevant insights on Islamic tourism in Nigeria with specific emphasis on the reasons behind the high cost and variations in the prices of Umra packages among travel agencies in Kano State of Nigeria. It is an exploratory study that uses a qualitative approach through in-depth interviews with senior officers of selected travel agencies in Kano. Findings from the study reveal that Umra pilgrims in Kano pay higher and different fares. It has also been established that there are variations in Umra prices due to some direct and indirect factors that determine Umra package fares. Consequently, it is recommended that there is a need for the National Hajj Commission of Nigeria (NAHCON) to properly regulate Umra pilgrimage like that of Hajj and to embark on an aggressive enlightenment campaign to educate potential and present Umra pilgrims on the necessary factors that affect the price of a typical Umra package and how they can identify a registered travel agency from a quack one so as to protect themselves against undue exploitation.

This chapter discusses the public enforcement regime for the application of Articles 101 and 102 under Regulation 1/2003. It explains the system that applied previously under Regulation 17, and the reasons for, and salient features of, the ‘modernisation’ introduced by Regulation 1/2003. The chapter then examines: the complaints procedure; the powers of the Commission, including the investigation and inter partes stages of its procedure; the decisions which the Commission may take, including decisions imposing fines and commitments decisions; judicial review by the EU Courts; the European Competition Network (ECN) and enforcement by national competition authorities, including the changes to be introduced by the ECN+ Directive; and the possibility of sanctions against individuals.. The chapter also considers the application of fundamental rights provisions in EU competition proceedings.

In some climes, the electoral law places a limit on the amount political parties and candidates can spend during campaigns. But very often, contestants and their parties flout the law on campaign funds limit especially in evolving democracies where the implementation of the law is weak. And this has prompted stakeholders in the political process to urgently canvass for the tracking of campaign funds by Election Management Bodies (EMBs). In Nigeria, despite the existence of a law which requires political parties to make public their campaign spending and submit same to the Independent National Electoral Commission for scrutiny, there appears to be a zero compliance with the Electoral Act. Political parties' non-compliance with the provisions of the law has placed INEC in a precarious situation as far as the tracking of campaign funds is concerned. It is against this backdrop that this chapter proffers solutions and recommends ways to make the electoral umpire live up to its responsibilities.

In this chapter, we identify and critically evaluate the kind of things that can go wrong in the criminal justice process and describe the institutional architecture used to regulate the actions and effects of criminal justice practitioners and to hold them to account. The focus of the chapter is on the organisational, legal and democratic regulatory and accountability mechanisms associated with the police, courts and CPS. Specifically the chapter covers: Police and Crime Commissioners; citizen- and volunteer-led forms of accountability/regulation; royal commissions, public inquiries and independent inquiries; police complaints processes and inspectorates; trial remedies and appeals; the Criminal Cases Review Commission; civil proceedings; inquests and Coronial Courts.

In this chapter, the author shall argue, with materials sourced through desk work, that although formal educational institutions, business and industries, multi-lateral agencies, religious institutions, and a handful of educational non-profits provide and support education and training for the workforce of the future in Nigeria, the tension created by the conflicting frameworks that undergird the provision of, and support for, education by the parties depresses funding for tertiary education, especially in times of economic crises. Inadequate funding of public education in general, and tertiary education in particular, is not, therefore, just a fall out of economic crises; it is also a result of the tension between stakeholders who hold the view that education is a social service, those who hold the view that education is an investment in human capital, and those who believe that education straddles the two frameworks. The author makes the point that the problems associated with inadequate funding of university education are aggravated by the overbearing influence of the National Universities Commission (NUC) in the administration of universities, resulting in low synergy of the output of the formal education system with the needs of business and industries and the requirements of community transformation.

Discrimination has been a central category in understanding inequality and exclusion in most societies. But exclusions vary in their scope and also in the specific socio-political ideologies underlying them. India has been on the whole more aware of discrimination than other countries but this awareness is for the most part restricted to caste based discrimination. It does not extend to recognition of discrimination against other groups, especially religious minorities even though there are significant differences in key outcomes between various social groups differentiated by religion and caste. It is important to recognize that religious identity remains an important axis of discrimination in India and today even more than before. Resentment and prejudice against minorities, particularly Muslims is common in India, as indeed in many developed and developing countries, but we have simply not acknowledged the sheer existence and scale of prejudice and discrimination. Hence, there has been little public debate or empirical analysis to establish the presence of discrimination against Muslims and/or identify its sources. Here’s the crucial point. The exclusion and discrimination of Muslims is not episodic: it is both everyday and institutional. It runs across all sectors and runs so deep that it appears normal to most people who perhaps don’t notice it or are unaware of it. This paper seeks to analyses social discrimination against Muslims and its manifestations. It has two main objectives. The first objective is to examine the concept and relevance of institutional discrimination with regard to the experience of Muslims in India, and to argue that the fight against institutional discrimination involves not only ideological/pedagogical struggle but also practical policy and legal measures to eradicate it. The second objective is to understand to what extent the ideology of majoritarianism has an influence on public institutions by delving deeper into the institutional bias of public policies and institutions. This is examined through two issues: the claims for Scheduled Caste status by Dalit Muslims and the recent decision of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) to investigate complaints of Hindu exodus from a town in the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. At the theoretical level, the paper examines the viability and implications of excluding religious minorities from the discourse of development and policy making in the context of the buildup of a new axis of majoritarian politics and the wider social and political context in which religion and religious communities have come to dominate public discourse in India, and yet governments disallow any policy that could ameliorate the socio-economic neglect of religious minorities.

According to the World Energy Council (WEC) the estimated energy of the wave power in the world is in the range of 8,000 to 80,000 TWh/year to depths of 100 meters or higher and actually the utilization of wave energy resource it is possible because it has been implemented in countries like Australia, Indonesia, Nigeria, United Kingdom, Norway, Portugal and Colombia evaluating different types of marine technologies that take the advantage of the kinetic energy in the ocean waves. Mexico according to the National Institute of Statistics and Information (INEGI) has a land area of 1,972,550 km2 of which has a coastline of 11,150 km having potential for the use of their coasts. Baja California with a land area of 71,445 km2 (3.6% of the country) is located on a peninsula in northwest Mexico and has 720 km of coastline on the Pacific Ocean (6.4% nationally) with a range of depths of 25.6 m to 650 m at a distance of the coastline of 15 km, which makes it suitable to evaluate the use of wave energy at local sites. With the completion of this work will contribute to the characterization of the sites that will present the best technical and economic conditions for its implementation, considering the physical characteristics of the site as well as connection points on the transmission lines operated by the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE). For the preparation of this study was carried out in three stages: a) Site Selection, b) Evaluation of Wave Energy and c) Economic evaluation of sites using RETScreen. Based on the characteristics of the coast of Baja California the results obtained are the following: 1) 18 sites were selected with a sea depth averaged of 50 m, the annual density power was 7.5 kW/m, this represents a potential of 210 MW considering an average length of 2 km in each site, 2) The economic evaluation of this type of project was for a period of 30 years in RETScreen, considers an annual inflation rate of 5% and obtains an investment cost of 9,538 US $/kW for this type of generation. We conclude that this source of energy will reduce dependence on fossil fuels and contribute to the generation of electricity in the state of Baja California diversifying the energetic matrix state by the use of clean and renewable sources, which represents an investment opportunity between the public and private sector.